Back from the lake, what’s next?

By Frogboy on May 17, 2009 7:43:49 PM from

The last few weeks have been pretty intense. Demigod has been unlike anything we’ve released before. The good news is that its sales have been really good and despite that first week which saw our network brought to its knees, the game’s average review scores have been 4 out of 5 (well over 4 out of 5 after the first week).

Our chief technology architect, Jeff Bargmann, who I brought onto Demigod a couple of weeks ago when it became clear that we were going to need to develop our own network solution for the game is clearly obsessed based on the 4am emails he sent me over the weekend. Jeff is also the lead developer on Impulse, ObjectDock, ObjectBar, Fences, and numerous other projects. When I absolutely positively must have something amazing done right and quickly, he is my go-to guy. So this weekend he’s been working on various proxy solutions. Cari, our lead game developer also found ways to solve some of the Pantheon and Skirmish issues that were reported over the weekend.

I don’t want to make any promises but given the success of Friday’s update and the likelyhood that the proxies will go online this week, we should be nearing the point of diminishing returns for getting people connected on the multiplayer match making side. I also know that Gas Powered Games is looking seriously at in-game connectivity.

Personally, I think the long-term solution is for us just to host the games entirely. That’s what we’re doing in Elemental for its multiplayer – our servers host the entire thing from the start.

But with the connectivity issues in MP likely to substantially diminish this week, it’s time to start thinking about what we should do next.

Demigod v1.1

So on the horizon there’s Demigod v1.1. Now, question is, what should be in it? Now, these aren’t expansion packs but I can think of a few things on my personal list that may or may not agree with what you guys want so let’s talk about that.

Here’s my personal preference list for v1.1 in brief:

Favor points increased by a factor of 10.
Option to Concede. Would let players quit a game they feel they’re losing. Their Demigod is removed. If all players from that team concede, the game is over.
Smart Quitting. If someone exits within the first 3 minutes, there’s no harm, no foul. It counts as a disconnect but not a loss. Sometimes there’s lag or someone has a slow machine or whatever.
Random Demigod. Players can choose a Random Demigod to play.
Updated AI. Smarter computer AI.
Various balance tweaking.

Now, this doesn’t include DLC content such as Clan Wars, Scheduled Games, Group Join, etc. This is just v1.1. But it does give you an idea of some of the things we’re thinking of.

What would you like to see in terms of new features?

+912 Karma | 180 Replies

Please, look into this connection problem: https://forums.demigodthegame.com/352130

I'll have more to say about this patch, but it's late here.

You can increase favor by 1000x but if the system doesn't even work, it won't matter. Start by fixing favor, please.

Concede button is also a major improvement. I don't like to ragequit and I want everyone to get favor for the round but there is no reason I should have to sit through an obvious loss, especially when I will only get 10-35 favor points.

From your list of things, those are the two main ones I can think of. I've made 3 posts with a suggestion each, one being well received is Erebus's poison potion showing up as such to teammates so they don't accidentally drink it.

Showing health bars AND mana bars please. Knowing if your allies (or enemies) are low or out of mana can be so important. I play Sedna a lot, sometimes you can die while trying to type "OOM" constantly. And my allies would know with just a split-second glance whether or not to stay in a fight because I'm near.

Quoting Heavenfall,

reply 7

Regarding Smart Quitting, can you add an additional trigger that is basically... 3min OR player has died once... Most people rage quit after they've died once (it's the DOTA curse).

this

V1.1 sounds fine and dandy.

I suppose added Demigods and Arenas will be added as DLC?

Oh, and what about all the favor I haven't been rewarded?

[edit] I just read through the responses and I am surprised to see that no one else has metioned this. I haven't been receiving any favor all weekend.

Favor fix would be super. Stuck at 340 since last update... not fun...

Self casting by clicking on your portrait in the middle of the screen and also make it so that I can move move to anywhere on the map by clicking on that point on the minimap.

Connection issues.

A huge upgrade/overhaul of the UI or just make it moddable. There is way too much important information it doesn't display, such as HP/Mana in NUMBERS, allies health/mana, minion health etc.

Remove people being put into a lobby before they are connected to everyone, this leads to people unwilling to leave a game lobby because they think they may still connect to the players even after a large chunk of time.

Did I mention connection issues?

I rekon instead of capping slows, i believe its at 30 % cap now, it should just become slowly less effective from say 20% onwards.

So 40% slow would equal about 35% actual slow and 60% would equal more like 45% actual, so that there is a benefit from mass slowing someone, but it just becomes less and less effective.

Frogboy,

Pretty please with sugar on top, do NOT allow a single player to concede without penalty. It should be a team decision or nothing. Even if you remove the demigod (rather than allow the AI to feed), it still greatly disadvantages the remaining teammates. People do need to be encouraged to finish games.

As for additional features (most of these are repeats):

1. Replays are a big one.

2.A few UI changes:

a. Health and mana bars for allies would be cool.

b. Show the damage that damage over time effects will do as a blinking section of the health bar, so people better know what to expect.

3. Random character select (you mentioned this already though)

As to balance:

- This isn't the place for specific suggestions, but I would take a look at favor items and try to balance them so that every favor item is equally good, and you choose the one you do because of your play style. I don't think that's the case now.

- Crits need a rework. You can potentially kill a full HP Demigod in a single lucky hit.

Are you guys gonna fix the remaining bugs in the next patch? The sad part is the biggest problem in this game for me is the multiplayer code in game. And I know you don't have full control in terms of the MP engine.. but the way the MP engine behaves sometimes is very strange.. i.e. Alt-tabbing causes lag to other players in game. If you click repeatedly issuing the same move command you lag the game, stuff like that.. I only began noticing it recently but its sure signs of a game not optimized properly for internet play. I really hope the engine gets fixed ASAP - is there any timeline on when the engine itself might actually get work done?

Other bugs still in the game that I've personally witnessed:

Multiplayer Lobby

- illegal exceptions when alt-tabbing in lobby when players try to connect.

User Interface

- mouse issues with dual screen monitors - when I move to 2nd monitor (unintentially when in full-screen mode, it alt -tabs me. When this happys during mp lobby it crashes the game.)

In-Game Bugs

- character stops moving to a certain point when using wand of speed

- cloak of fire item causes dmg to all heroes (including yourself) and not just enemies

- game shuts down with no error message or anything displayed (Back to desktop) - happens to me about 1 in 15 games

I'm only listing this stuff here because I love this game! Thank you.

People have mentioned this, but what is the point of a mini-map if you can't do anything with it? You should be able to click-move/ click-move to on it. It's only semi-useful now. That needs to be added as well.

Some things the game really needs:

-Blind selection in custom games, you can't see what demigods the other team is picking.

-More standardized settings. There should be a number of simple pre-sets that can be easily seen from the lobby. Thus the default setting can become "standard" with options limited to favor on or favor off. Then games where you change settings are labeled "custom." Additional game styles can be added as they are found to be good.

-personal black lists, you need to be able to avoid problem players, especially since some of them have connection issues that destroy games

I'm for replays, voip, and community-built custom maps.

I'd really like to see:

1. Ability to pool money for citadel upgrades (aka https://forums.demigodthegame.com/350937 )

2. Replay functionality - this is a MUST for RTS games.

3. Ability to temporarily draw on the mini-map or tactical ping it (aka https://forums.demigodthegame.com/350468 )

Beyond that i'd love to see:

1. Another handful of new demigods to truly diversify what we're seeing ingame matchup wise.

2. Another handful of new maps for the most popular game types (aka 3v3 / 4v4)

3. A 'crash hard drive button' which is useable on rage quitters (ok not really..mostly)

Improving Demigod's cpu ai should not be a priority at this point whatsoever. This is a multiplayer game and your idea about conceding shows that putting an ai in multiplayer isn't a good thing... Improving that ai is just a waste of time when there are other things that could be added/changed/fixed that are more urgent.

First, there are the bugs. Favor still doesn't accumulate game to game. The I can't attack/cast until I move bug still exists. Stacking regulus or rook is imba. Heart of life is overpowered. We need more demigods. Alt + tab still crashes the game half the time.

Additionally, your ideas seem to reward and reinforce rage quitting, letting people leave in the first 3 minutes, and making favor less important. This seems counterproductive to me.

Quoting Deepjay,

reply 15

I'd really like to see:

3. A 'crash hard drive button' which is useable on rage quitters (ok not really..mostly)

Gotta be a way to develop the code that manages to knock me off the internet every now and then in Demigod games with proper port forwarding... meh...

I would think 1.1 should concentrate on the relatively easy-to-do improvements and updates. Your list is good, although I think a "factor of 10" is maybe too much of a favor boost. over 1,000 favor for a single match? Maybe a factor of... 5 or 6. Concede, smart-quitting, and random demigod choice are all great ideas.

Okay, so, the wishlist for 1.1:

1. A tutorial. Seriously. We've all heard it before, the cries of the community and reviewers were not wrong. It will help with long-term sales. Make it happen. This is the hardest 1.1 improvement to make, resource-wise, but it needs to be done and post-release is not too late.

2. Clickable mini-map.

3. An option to not have the view zoomed/rotated when you respawn. I'm tired of fixing it after every death.

4. Click column heads in the custom game browser to sort by that column.

5. Add a separate small column with a lock icon to indicate password protected games. The asterisk in the player count is a terribly unintuitive way to handle this.

6. Fix the audio bug that seems related to the opening movies. Adding the command-line parameter is good, but nobody should have to look up how to do that.

7. Let players know the map and gametype of a Pantheon game before they choose their demigod. They still have to pick the proper light/dark side, of course. But if it's a Fortress battle, I might want someone different than if it's Conquest.

8. The game is forgetful. It should remember which health-bar state I last used (the ~ key) from match to match, even after I shut down and restart the game. Ditto with the custom game sorting (see #4). Ditto with map zoom and orientation.

9. Improved in-game chat interface. Voice chat is obviously vastly preferable, and there's tons of good middleware out there to integrate into Impulse. But that's a bit large for a 1.1 feature. in-game chat disappears too quickly, needs team/all color coding, needs better size and position, etc.

Oh, and Favor is busted. It goes without saying that, before 1.1, we should have the game as it exists now fixed to working order. Neither myself nor anyone I have played with all weekend has had their Favor actually update.

Since the last patch I can't play online anymore. But I'd love to see an improved AI and more maps. Thanks for all your hard worik!

More Demigods

More Maps

More Balance

Replays

And please fix the click bug that still lingers :/

Sounds good.. but I agree with many above. FORGET THE AI. Please REMOVE IT from Multiplayer. IF one wants to practice there are single player tournaments etc. AI has no place in ranked environment... Nobody takes Pantheon serious. Removing AI from pantheon and adding team joins to it would greatly enhance the experience of D e m i g o d. Please seriously consider this.

but given the success of Friday’s update

I would beg to differ on this.

Personally, I think the long-term solution is for us just to host the games entirely.

Is this something that is being worked on for Demigod ?

Otherwise, your list of features planned / hoped for in version 1.1 looks good. Especially the part about improved AI.

I am going to recap some of the best suggestions i've seen:

1. VoIP

2. Have the picture of all your ally demigods at the bottom of the screen. Be able to buff, heal, or restore by clicking on item and then on the picture of the demigod (Your demigod will have to walk within range of the demigod and cast)

3. Check to see how many pets you have by having a picture of the creep pet and a number in the middle (BamboodPanda's suggestion)

4. Replays (which the option to click on any one of your ally demigod and see what items they are using, how much HP/MP they have at any point in the game and what status ailment if they have any)

5. Be able to contribute partial gold to items in Citadel.

6. Fix the HP bar on demigod. It is different than HP when viewed with a mouseover. Usually the HP on the demigod shows less HP than when you have your mouse on top of the demigod and see his actual HP (this has probably cost plenty of demigod kills because someone follows an erroneous dying demigod into the base when there was really no way to kill him)

7. Have an ability, scroll or potion that will allow a demigod to view enemy demigod's mana. This information is extremely valuable (some balancing might be needed to make sure people are not abusing this to get more kills easily)

8. Allow items with a percentage to couter an enemy demigod's spells (I think at this point.. you can only evade normal weapon hit)

9. Allow for items to increase spell power potency in exchange for armor/hp.

10. Keep working on the connection issues - It is still not there yet. I have also noticed the game itself is not as stable. I have been in many games where everyone just gets disconnected from the game and I am left playing bots. This has happened enough times to warrant me posting about it here. I know Stardock has nothing to do with the player connectivity once the game starts, but I think GPG might have done something that breaks the connection half way (or 3/4's) of the game through (UDP buffer overflow?)

PS: The new connectivity patch is much much better.. there are certain times it still reverts to what it was before (the amount of time it takes to connect) and there is a quirky issue where some players get a rediculous ping (4000+ ms ping) which gradually comes down to something normal (150ms-300ms)

My vote is for the enabling of UI mods for online play.

quoting post

Smart Quitting. If someone exits within the first 3 minutes, there’s no harm, no foul. It counts as a disconnect but not a loss. Sometimes there’s lag or someone has a slow machine or whatever.

I can already see this being abused.

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Back from the lake, what’s next?